Rava announced, or Rav Pappa announced
There are several points I wanted to make over the past few days, but I was otherwise occupied, or else I limit myself to one post per day so that it is not overwhelming. I may therefore be playing catch-up in the next few posts. First, here’s an old post about the derasha at the top of today’s daf, contrasting yakriv to lirtzono.
Then, today’s post. From Friday, Bava Batra 45b:
מַכְרֵיז רָבָא, וְאִיתֵּימָא רַב פָּפָּא: דְּסָלְקִין לְעֵילָּא וּדְנָחֲתִין לְתַתָּא; הַאי בַּר יִשְׂרָאֵל דְּזָבֵין לֵיהּ חֲמָרָא לְיִשְׂרָאֵל חַבְרֵיהּ, וְקָא אָתֵי גּוֹי וְאָנֵיס לֵיהּ מִינֵּיהּ, דִּינָא הוּא דִּמְפַצֵּי לֵיהּ מִינֵּיהּ.
§ The Gemara relates: Rava announced, and some say it was Rav Pappa who announced: All those who ascend from Babylonia to Eretz Yisrael and all those who descend from Eretz Yisrael to Babylonia should be aware of the following: In a case of this Jew who sold a donkey to another Jew, and then a gentile came and seized it from him, claiming that it was really his, the halakha is that the seller should rescue [dimfatzei] it from the gentile or reimburse the buyer.
This is then restricted (either by the original speaker or by the Talmudic Narrator) by a וְלָא אֲמַרַן אֶלָּא or two, in which the selling need not reimburse. Yet, Ameimar argues, and says that he need not even reimburse absent all of these factors.
אַמֵּימָר אָמַר: אֲפִילּוּ לֵיכָּא כׇּל הָנֵי – לָא. מַאי טַעְמָא? מִידָּע יָדַע דִּסְתַם גּוֹי אַנָּס הוּא – שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר: ״אֲשֶׁר פִּיהֶם דִּבֶּר שָׁוְא וִימִינָם יְמִין שָׁקֶר״.
Ameimar said: Even if there are not any of these factors, the seller is not liable to reimburse him. What is the reasoning for this? It is that it is known that an ordinary gentile is an extortionist, so it is assumed that the donkey did indeed belong to the seller, as it is stated: “Whose mouth speaks falsehood, and their right hand is a right hand of lying” (Psalms 144:8).
How do we rule? There’s an interesting non-existent Rashbam:
אפילו ליכא כל הני - אינו מכיר בה שהיא בת חמורו ולא אניס לאוכפא אפילו הכי לא מפצי ליה דסתם עובד כוכבים אנס הוא [והכי קי"ל משום דאמימר בתראה הוא]:
That text, together with the surrounding square brackets, is present in the Vilna Shas printing. But in Venice, it was absent.
The maggid shiur said that those words were added by the Maharshal.
The idea presented in square brackets is that, since Ameimar is a batra’a, a later Amora, we rule like him.
However, Ameimar was a fifth- and sixth-generation Amora. He was a student of Rava, and sixth-generation Rav Ashi was a talmid chaver (student and colleague).
Recall that there was two internal variants as to who was machriz, announced this law. If it was Rava, I can go along with the idea that he is a later Amora. However, if it was actually fifth-generation Rav Pappa (another student of Rava) who announced this, I don’t think that someone who spans generations and is even a contemporary should be considered a batra’a. It is just two colleagues who are arguing.
By the way, this fits in to an earlier Jewish Link article I wrote, about confusing Rava with Rav Papapa.
This would not be an example of a P-word in proximity. There is a “Rabba” who follows, to whom Abaye objects which is some manuscripts is Rava, and I could write an entire post (though I probably won’t —sorry) on which of the Rabbas should be Rava and vice versa. That might be what introduces a Rava, if Rav Pappa was the original. Or, it could be as Tosafot say, that the confusion was because it was unclear whether Rav Pappa was saying his own idea or that of his teacher, which leads to a common confusion or conflation.